Media Credit to Bush?

2. In a puffball 2004 CBS "60 Minutes" interview with John Kerry and John Edwards, Lesley Stahl asked, "Ron Reagan Jr. was very critical of President Bush invoking religion when it comes to policy, particularly in the war in Iraq. He said something like he felt that Bush was justifying the war in Iraq by citing God. And he said that is what Osama bin Laden does, and he said that there's no place for that. What do you think of that?"

Kerry replied by merely laying out the Abe Lincoln quote that he hoped to be on God's side. He didn't suggest comparing Bush to Osama was distasteful. Instead, he said, "It is not the job of the president of the United States to decide what the religion of America is or what the religion of the world should be."

3. Days before the election in 2004, when Osama released a tape attacking Bush, former CBS anchor Walter Cronkite went on CNN's "Larry King Live" and insisted with a straight face that Karl Rove "probably set up" this tape with al-Qaida.

4. In January 2006, CNN commentator Jack Cafferty also insisted Bush colluded with al-Qaida: "The last time we got a tape from Osama bin Laden was right before the 2004 presidential election. Now here we are, four days away from hearings starting in Washington into the wiretapping of America's telephones without bothering to get a court order or a warrant, and up pops another tape from Osama bin Laden. Coincidence? Who knows?"

5. In that same month, Chris Matthews asked Bush aide Karen Hughes on Osama's behalf that our military presence in Saudi Arabia was "insulting his country" and was to blame for 9/11. "Are we sometimes to blame for the hell that we've raised?" It was the kind of question the Rev. Jeremiah Wright would likely ask.

Imagine any of these people suggesting an alliance or a similarity between Obama and Osama. Hell would freeze over. Why did our media so easily and carelessly smear Bush with an Osama brush? They still have much to answer for.